


Like A Scotch Jig

by violentdarlings



Series: piece by piece [3]
Category: Guardians of the Galaxy (Movies)
Genre: Dancing, F/M, He just lives no explanation needed, Ravager Dance Party, Self-Esteem Issues, Yondu Udonta Lives
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-16
Updated: 2017-09-16
Packaged: 2018-12-30 12:57:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,627
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12109194
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/violentdarlings/pseuds/violentdarlings
Summary: The Guardians get invited to party with the Ravagers.





	Like A Scotch Jig

Nebula did not want to come tonight.

She’s on Stakar Ogord’s ship with the rest of the Guardians (she still doesn’t consider herself one, but apparently everyone else does), in the middle of a massive party of Ravagers. Every colour of jacket is there, and just about every species in the galaxy, from those that could pass as Terrans like Quill to the astonishingly unusual (the red guy with the tail who communicates with golden hand signals, for instance). Nebula lurks in the corner and tries to communicate her utter distaste for the event.

“ _I came with you to protect people,” she’d said to Gamora sharply earlier that evening. “Like you said. Little girls like us. I gave up on killing Thanos for that. How does going to a party protect the galaxy?”_

_Gamora had been pinning up her hair. “One night off, Nebula,” she’d said wearily; there were dark green shadows under her eyes. “Go and put something nice on.”_

_“I ought to throttle you with something nice,” Nebula had snipped at her, but had gone back to her quarters all the same, and put on her only dress._

_Looking at herself in the mirror was a mistake. She saw a mutilated, mechanical body, so much more of herself than she usually saw, for all the dress covered all her legs and most of her arms. And it was soft, highlighting the parts of herself she usually tried to minimise; her breasts, her ass, her legs. What was the point of trying to look sexual when she was more machine than woman? Even with the lingerie on underneath (her secret weapon against feeling like she’s completely artificial rather than just a heavily augmented cyborg) doesn’t help. Nebula wants nothing more than to strip off the stupid dress and hide under her bed._

_But Gamora had given her an order, and Gamora was second in command. Nebula is a soldier. She does not disobey orders, even if they come from her little sister._

_She made it outside, and would have turned around and gone straight back in, had Rocket not been walking past (in a different jumpsuit than usual, and for once clean of engine grease). He’d said, incredibly offhandedly like he’d barely noticed her, “Looking good, Blue,” and just like that Nebula could stand it._

But this is different. Nebula scowls down at her glass, and stomps over to the bar for another drink. Kraglin is tending bar for the hour (there’s a rotation, apparently) but he’s already been in the Krylorian punch; his hands are shaking. “Hey,” he greets her, handing over something she didn’t even ask for. “Here you go, pal.”

 _Pal_. Fucking hell.

Nebula’s making her way back to her corner when a strong, heavily-muscled arm sweeps her into a side corridor. Only her superior reflexes stop her from dropping the glass; only recognising her accoster at the last moment stops her from snapping his neck.

“I ought to kill you for taking liberties with my person,” Nebula hisses at Yondu furiously. The Ravager just smirks at her.

“Come here,” he says, and snakes his arms around her. Nebula goes still.

“What… in the hell… do you think you’re doing?” she grits out. Yondu shrugs.

“Girl’s gotta know how to dance,” he informs her gruffly. “Willin’ to bet your old man was more concerned with teachin’ you how to kill folks.” Nebula nods stiffly.

“You are right,” she replies, rigid in Yondu’s loose embrace. “I… do not know how to dance.” Yondu snorts, and takes the glass from her hand, setting it down nearby.

“Neither does Quill, but that don’t stop him none.” Despite herself, Nebula feels the corner of her mouth turn up just slightly. She can still see Quill in the centre of the room, dancing energetically and blissfully by himself, limbs flailing everywhere. Nebula is not sure where her sister is, probably lurking nearby with Drax. They both claim not to be dancers, yet there is a certain poetry to the way Drax dismembers foes with his knives. As for Gamora, Nebula had once accidentally walked on her in Quill’s arms, the two of them swaying on the spot, eyes closed.

(It had felt uncomfortably like spying, and Nebula had hastily withdrawn, before either could notice her presence.)

“Dancing is not for assassins,” Nebula informs Yondu tartly. The Ravager smirks.

“Which is why I’ve got you here in the corner, not out there with Quill,” he says. “Come on, girly. Unless you’re scared?”

Nebula is not _scared_.

“Be aware that someday I will enjoy removing your organs in alphabetical order,” she tells him, and places her metal hand on his shoulder. Yondu takes the other in his own. His smirk has mellowed into something kinder.

“Understood,” he replies, and guides her gently backwards. “You know I’ve got four lungs, right?” Nebula smirks.

“It’s amusing that you think you’ll survive that long,” she says, to cover how awkward she feels. The song is slow and easy, one of Quill’s she thinks, and Yondu, whatever else he may be, leads well. But all the same, Nebula feels like she’s about to itch out of her skin. Maybe it’s the drinks, although she’s barely touched them; maybe it’s Yondu’s steady, crimson eyes, or how warm he feels against her thickened skin.

And he won’t stop looking at her.

“What are you staring at,” she mutters, looking away. Yondu spins them carefully.

“You,” he replies. Nebula scowls.

“I know that,” she growls at him. “Why are you staring at me?” Yondu shrugs.

“You’re a pretty thing, however much you don’t think it,” he says, his face close to hers. “And you’re fierce. Strong.”

Nebula blinks. “You’re going soft, old man,” she tells him through a throat gone tight. Yondu throws back his head and laughs; once, it would have been bitter and cold, but now there is only warmth in it. Being with his old Ravager buddies these past months has done him good.

“You’re probably right,” he agrees, and thankfully does not call her pretty again. Nebula is not sure whether she would start trembling or attempt to kill him with her bare hands.

Still. Pretty. Fierce. Strong. She has not been called any of those before. It is not loud enough to silence the constant refrain of monster, weakling, hideous that usually echoes around her artificial brain, but it is an interesting change.

Yondu’s probably drunk, she decides, and ignores how light and agile he is on his feet, how his words aren’t slurring, and how he looks at her like she’s something worth seeing.

She studies him as he guides her through another turn. He’s blue like her, although perhaps just a shade lighter, his skin dull instead of glossy, and he wears the tall, curved fin all the time now. Nebula is not willing to admit it suits him, that the long Ravager coat does something very interesting to his broad shoulders, that the smile and scowl lines on his face have their own odd, craggy appeal. Time has changed Yondu Udonta.

Nebula wonders what it might do to her.

“Now who’s staring?” he says, his voice dropping low and smooth. Nebula’s stomach feels like some small animal has briefly been caught in it.

“I am not,” she mutters, aware of the rasp of her own voice, that the low timbre of it is always going to be there, that her cybernetic brain and mechanical arm will always be a part of her. She hates it, but Nebula’s a realist. She’d die without them, now. Idly she wonders what Thanos did with the pieces he cut out of her, cut off of her. Whether he burned them or dumped them in the trash.

While Nebula was contemplating, she hadn’t realised that they’ve stopped dancing. Yondu’s just standing there with his arms around her, looking down at her face. “Aw, hell,” he mutters. “It’ll be worth getting stabbed for.”

Yondu leans down and kisses her on the mouth.

Nebula goes still for an instant, before her instincts kick in and she delivers a truly astonishing, even by her standards, punch to his jaw. Yondu goes down like a sack of cement. Nebula looms over him, ready to smack him one again.

“What the hell are you playing at?” she growls. Yondu, on his ass on the floor, is rubbing his jaw and chuckling to himself. “Did someone put you up to this?” His red eyes are amused.

“No, girl,” he says, still laughing as he hauls himself to his feet. “Just wanted to kiss you, is all. Badass girl like you ought to get kissed once in a while.”

“Badass girl like me hasn’t ever been kissed before in any while,” Nebula snaps back before she can think better of it. The amusement fades from Yondu’s face.

“Shit,” he says. “I didn’t know that. Sorry, girl.” Nebula takes a deep breath, examines him once more.

“Hell with it,” she snaps, and drags Yondu in by his lapels.

It’s weird. She doesn’t know what to do with her mouth, with her tongue, but Yondu seems like he knows what he’s doing. He wraps his muscled arms around her, like Nebula’s something being kept close and tight, like she’s worth protecting, and he tastes like harsh Ravager alcohol and something odd, something organic, something man.

He mutters something against her lips, something that sounds suspiciously like, “hell, darlin’,” and Nebula’s never been this close to anyone she wasn’t killing.

She stands there, uncertain and bewildered and being kissed within an inch of her life by a big blue jackass space pirate, and it might just be the best she’s ever felt.

Tentatively, Nebula puts her arms around Yondu’s shoulders, and kisses him back.


End file.
